Tuesday, May 12, 2009

People often assume that short hair = low maintenance. In some ways that's true. Short haired dogs don't demand frequent trips to the groomer. They're easy to keep clean and don't need expensive haircuts.

But short hair also has an annoying tendency to fall out easily. Especially if it belongs to a densely coated dog like a Pug or Dalmatian. Live with one of these breeds and, like it or not, you will develop a new hobby: hair removal. Whatever time you don't lose to detangling knotted hair will be devoted to sweeping, vacuuming, swiffering, lint-brushing, and duct-taping every surface of your self, car and home.

To illustrate just how much shedding can happen in one 1,000 sq ft apartment, brother Dutch and I are going fill this 15 qt Ikea waste bin with discarded dog hair. Our human has agreed to only put ambient shedding in this bin -- y'know, no massive piles from Furminator sessions (we'll share one of those later!) just stuff that gets swept or sucked up with the scary vacuum.

I am a siamese kitty and I shed a lot, too. I am quite finicky about grooming, so I lick myself a lot and end up eating lots of hair. My mommy said this would give me hairballs. She was right. I thought hairballs would be all cute and furry like me. They are not.